Author Topic: What Are You Doing for New Year's Eve?  (Read 310574 times)

Offline serious crayons

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Re: What Are You Doing for New Year's Eve?
« Reply #140 on: January 02, 2011, 12:44:47 pm »
OMG. [Blushing smiley!] This is really humiliating and humbling -- not just to have my grammatical error noticed by a non-native-English speaker, but especially THAT particular grammatical error, which always always makes me scoff when other people make it!

And native English speakers make it all the time. I always think, "Duh, if you took the 'brother' and 'sons' out of the sentence, would you say 'My step-mother took I out to lunch?' No? Then what's your problem??"

I guess the error is common because people with REALLY bad grammar are likely to say "Me and my brother took my step-mother out to lunch." So teachers harp on the fact that it should be "My brother and I." So then people, trying too hard to be correct, stick with "I" even when "I" is the object of the sentence rather than the subject.

In my case, the only excuse I can offer is that it was 1:30 a.m. and I'd had a lot of wine with dinner.


Offline Meryl

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Re: What Are You Doing for New Year's Eve?
« Reply #141 on: January 02, 2011, 12:50:35 pm »
Tonight my brother and some close friends and I had crab legs, prime rib of beef, smoked-salmon spread, risotto, haricots verts with bacon, flan, krumkake and a few other things. A NYE dinner got delayed until NYD, partly because the weather was bad yesterday, partly because I had a touch of the flu. I made a few of the things, and supplied the venue.

On Thursday I had cassoulet, too, Meryl! My step-mother took my brother and sons and I out to lunch. So cassoulet, champagne and a little trois-creme dessert that included pot de crème, crème broulet and crème caramel.

Meryl, your and John's tradition sounds really wonderful. Happy belated Hogmany, Meryl and everyone!

We're on the same wave-length, Katherine!  I never had had cassoulet before, but I could see making it a tradition on New Year's.  I think Jack and Ennis would have gone for it, too.  8)

Your dinner sounds delish.  What exactly is krumkake?

Don't worry about the grammatical error!  I think the late hour and the wine are a perfectly valid excuse.  Kudos to Chrissi, though, for making her English studies count.  ;)
Ich bin ein Brokie...

Offline Monika

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Re: What Are You Doing for New Year's Eve?
« Reply #142 on: January 02, 2011, 01:03:29 pm »
I had a nice supper of crab legs at home with good friends and watched the ball drop.  Could hear the fireworks banging away over in Central Park.  Happy 2011!  :D

On Thursday John Gallagher and I continued a tradition begun last year of going out on New Year's Eve eve.  We ate dinner on the Lower East Side at Mary Queen of Scots and celebrated an early Hogmanay.  It was the perfect place to bestow the last of my Edinburgh purchases on a friend: a lamb's wool tartan scarf bought on the Royal Mile.  :D  John gave me a tiny Gumby sitting on a blue horse and a fun book called "Lexicon of Musical Invective," a compilation of horrible reviews given to famous composers.  ;D

We ate a hearty winter dinner of cassoulet, boudin noir, Scotch salmon salad, pork belly, chips with curry sauce and fried Brussels sprouts, washed down with a gin cocktail, good red wine and a Smuttynose IPA lager.  Dessert was Scotch ice cream made with Laphroaig. Yum!

Next we walked a few blocks uptown and had Australian coffee at the Tuck Shop, a great little hole-in-the-wall that specializes in meat pies.  Our Swedes have visited there, too, as has oilgun.  8)

We finished up, as we did last year, with a stop at Cafe Mogador.  John had port wine and I had Moroccan mint tea and orange almond cake.  We parted at the L train station around midnight.  Thanks, dear friend, for another great Gallagher-esque evening!  :-*
Love reading about your and John´s new tradition. Sounds like a great time and great food and drinks were being had!
And especially that Scotch ice cream.....mmmmmm

Thanks for the ling to the Australian coffee place, Meryl. I remember wondering about that a while back and exactly where it was located.


Happy New Year!

Offline Meryl

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Re: What Are You Doing for New Year's Eve?
« Reply #143 on: January 02, 2011, 01:19:55 pm »
Love reading about your and John´s new tradition. Sounds like a great time and great food and drinks were being had!
And especially that Scotch ice cream.....mmmmmm

Thanks for the ling to the Australian coffee place, Meryl. I remember wondering about that a while back and exactly where it was located.

Happy New Year!

Yeah, the Scotch ice cream was interesting--kind of had a smoky taste.  Glad I could help out with the link.  Happy New Year to you, too, Monika!  8)
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Offline serious crayons

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Re: What Are You Doing for New Year's Eve?
« Reply #144 on: January 02, 2011, 01:29:22 pm »
Your dinner sounds delish.  What exactly is krumkake?

Krumkake is (are?) a crunchy Swedish cookie, lightly flavored with cardamon. Imagine a really flat pancake made in a press like a waffle iron with an elaborate flowery design, then rolled into a cylinder maybe 1 to 2 inches in diameter. My friend received a krumkake iron for Christmas from her family, so she made them, as well as the flan. She filled them with whipped cream, making them a little like Swedish cannoli.

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Don't worry about the grammatical error!  I think the late hour and the wine are a perfectly valid excuse.  Kudos to Chrissi, though, for making her English studies count.  ;)

I never stop being astounded by the English skills of our EuroBrokies.  :D


Offline Penthesilea

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Re: What Are You Doing for New Year's Eve?
« Reply #145 on: January 02, 2011, 01:33:32 pm »
OMG. [Blushing smiley!] This is really humiliating and humbling -- not just to have my grammatical error noticed by a non-native-English speaker, but especially THAT particular grammatical error, which always always makes me scoff when other people make it!

Shit. That's hard. :laugh: ;)
But to give you your confidence back: I read this particular error so many times that I started to question myself, and my English teachers. When I saw you (of all people) writing it this way, I was halfways convinced it must be correct. If Katherine writes [whatever] it must be corrrect English. That's how much confidence I have in your language skills. One error doesn't take from it. We're all human, even pro writers.


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And native English speakers make it all the time. I always think, "Duh, if you took the 'brother' and 'sons' out of the sentence, would you say 'My step-mother took I out to lunch?' No? Then what's your problem??"

Exactly! That's what I was always thinking.


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In my case, the only excuse I can offer is that it was 1:30 a.m. and I'd had a lot of wine with dinner.

That's two excuses and they're both valid, if you ask me. :)

Offline Sason

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Re: What Are You Doing for New Year's Eve?
« Reply #146 on: January 02, 2011, 01:42:40 pm »
Krumkake is (are?) a crunchy Swedish cookie, lightly flavored with cardamon. Imagine a really flat pancake made in a press like a waffle iron with an elaborate flowery design, then rolled into a cylinder maybe 1 to 2 inches in diameter. My friend received a krumkake iron for Christmas from her family, so she made them, as well as the flan. She filled them with whipped cream, making them a little like Swedish cannoli.


It sounds delicious. But it doesn't sound Swedish  ;D.

The word 'krumkake' sounds Norwegian to me. If it's indeed Swedish, it's a dialectal word that I've never heard of.

The way you describe them being made is traditional here in some parts of the country, not sure they used to be filled though.

And what the hell is Swedish cannoli???  :o ;D

Düva pööp is a förce of natüre

Offline CellarDweller

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Re: What Are You Doing for New Year's Eve?
« Reply #147 on: January 02, 2011, 01:55:18 pm »
New Year's Eve was at my friends' house, Tina and Bill.

I got there about 8:00, and just hung out, ate, drank talked, laughed, and watched the ball drop at midnight.  After that, we went onto their porch and started shouting, banging pots and pans, whistling, and shooting off some fireworks.


Tell him when l come up to him and ask to play the record, l'm gonna say: ''Voulez-vous jouer ce disque?''
'Voulez-vous, will you kiss my dick?'
Will you play my record? One-track mind!

Offline Penthesilea

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Re: What Are You Doing for New Year's Eve?
« Reply #148 on: January 02, 2011, 02:02:16 pm »
Krumkake is (are?) a crunchy Swedish cookie, lightly flavored with cardamon. Imagine a really flat pancake made in a press like a waffle iron with an elaborate flowery design, then rolled into a cylinder maybe 1 to 2 inches in diameter. My friend received a krumkake iron for Christmas from her family, so she made them, as well as the flan. She filled them with whipped cream, making them a little like Swedish cannoli.


To me krumkake sounds like krummholz. :)

krum might derivate from krumm (=twisted, winded, curved, not straight). Or it might derivate from Krumen, Krümel (= crumbs).

A winded cake or a dry, and thus friable cake.



Did it look a bit like this?


It's called Schillerlocken in German (=Schiller's locks) - but don't ask me why, I have no idea. :laugh:
And they are winded. You take a narrow, long piece of dough and wind it around a form:



Maybe this type of cake/cookies made its way from Germany via Norway (or the other way round) to the US. ;D

Offline serious crayons

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Re: What Are You Doing for New Year's Eve?
« Reply #149 on: January 02, 2011, 02:21:22 pm »
It sounds delicious. But it doesn't sound Swedish  ;D.

The word 'krumkake' sounds Norwegian to me. If it's indeed Swedish, it's a dialectal word that I've never heard of.I sh

I stand corrected again! I should probably just stay away from this thread.  :laugh: I knew I was on rather thin ice, describing what I thought was a Swedish food in the presence of actual Swedes. Anyway, my friend's family is Swedish by descent (Soderberg), so I guess they think of it as Swedish. But according to Wikipedia, it's Norwegian.

Krumkake or 'Krum kaka' (English pronunciation: /ˈkruːmkɑːkə/, meaning bent or curved cake, plural krumkaker) is a Norwegian waffle cookie made of flour, butter, eggs, sugar, and cream. Krumkake are traditionally made during the Christmas season.

A special decorative two-sided iron griddle, similar to a waffle iron, is used to bake the thin round cakes. Older irons are used over the stove, but modern electric irons offer the convenience of nonstick surfaces, automatic timing, and multiple cakes per batch. While hot, the 13–20 cm krumkake are rolled into small cones around a wooden or plastic cone form. Krumkake can be eaten plain or filled with whipped cream (often multekrem) or other fillings.

These cookies are popular not only in Norway but also among Norwegian immigrant descendants in the American Midwest. Krumkaker are traditionally made in preparation for Christmas, along with other Norwegian sweets including Sandbakelse and Rosettes. They offer a sweet dessert after the traditional Christmas Eve dinner of ribs or pinnekjøtt.

In Germany, the cookies are commonly filled with sweet stuffings. They are also used as a type of ice cream cone.


Here's a picture:



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And what the hell is Swedish cannoli???  :o ;D

That was just my little joke -- cannoli are Italian, crisp cylindrical pastries with creamy filling. Again, Wikipedia:

Cannoli are Sicilian pastry desserts. The singular is cannolo (or in the Sicilian language cannolu), meaning "little tube", with the etymology stemming from the Latin "canna", or reed. Cannoli originated in Sicily and are an essential part of Sicilian cuisine. They are also popular in Italian American cuisine and in the United States are known as a general Italian pastry, while they are specifically Sicilian in origin (in Italy, they're commonly known as "cannoli siciliani", Sicilian cannoli).

Cannoli consist of tube-shaped shells of fried pastry dough, filled with a sweet, creamy filling usually containing ricotta cheese and chopped succade. They range in size from "cannulicchi", no bigger than a finger, to the fist-sized proportions typically found in Piana degli Albanesi, south of Palermo, Sicily.